Wichita eagle., 1887-06-24

| It will not allow monopolies to crowd out
the smaller firms by great rebates on
freight. Take, for instance, Phillip Ar
| mour's meat establishment at Kansas City.
Armour can have packed here 1000 car
loads of hogs. He can then 60 to the rail
roads and say: Now I want your lowest
rate for the shipping of these to Chicago,
and if you do not give it will 60 to one
of the other railroads. The freight at the
time is perhaps light on the railroad. They
have to keep their cars running at any rate,
and they will take ArmOurs meat for q
| little more than the actual cost of the wear
| and tear of the cars. The result is the
pork is put into Chicago at less rate than
any small dealer can send it there, and the
small dealer is crowded out Of the mar
ket In the same way butcher
within one hundred miles of Chicago
makes his living out of killing the dry COWS
of the neighborhood. Armour comes to
him and says: Now, can sell you bet
ter meat than this and at a less price. There
is no use in your killing these cows. Let
them be sent to Chicago and sold The
butchers, perhaps. refuses. He can make
more from selling the cows he buys from
the farmers. and the farmers can get more
for the COWS than if he ships them to Chi
cago. Armour then establishes his own
butcher, and by reduction of the rates of
freight, which he can secure, he can sell
at such prices that the home butcher Is
crowded out of the market This will, l
think, be impossible under the new law,
and it is only an instance Of many ways IN
which it will benefit the smaller dealers of
the country"
Another instance occurs to me in the
case of a cement establishment, which has
been working within 100 miles of Wichita,
Kansas. The cement here made Is as good
as the Louisville cement, which is noted
over the United States Itwas sold to ad
vantage in Wichita until the railroads put
down the freight on the Louisville cement
to such degree that they were able to
send it to Wichita at the same cost that the
Fort Scott cement could be sent there, and
the result was that the Louisville cement
caused the shutting up of the Fort Scott
cement factory. The Louisville factory
had their goods carried 1000 miles fol
the same money for which the Western
cement makers could get theirs carried 16O
miles. Under the new law the Western
cement makers would have the advantage
in frieghts over the territory nearest to
them. | believe it will be to the benefit of
the country to build up industries where
ever they can be built rather than the
congregation of them in the largest cities.
A distribution of manufactures over the
country will benefit even as diversity OF
industries benefits any country. The law
might have to be changed in some particu-
lars, but think it has come to stay"
"You spoka of Wichita. | understand
the city is growing very rapidly?"
"Yes, Wichita is booming as much as
any city in the west l was told by a
freight agent of the Santa Fe road that it
was almost impossible to unload the cars
fast enough of building material, and that
he had l 900 car loads of this nature in his
Wichita yards at the time he spoke to me.
Wichita has now about 30, 600 people, and
80, 600 in the west is equal to 100000 in
the east. The people have more enterprise
about them, and with them nothing is i'm
possible. The growth in Kansas, however,
is not confined to Wichita. Every city |
in the state is growing. and real estate val |
ues have been rising very rapidly.
Il think there has been real estate |
boom over the whole country, and it seems
to me it is the result of so many people |
leaving the country and going to the cities.
There has been general exodus OF this
nature within the past few years, and the
cities are just beginning to appreciate 1t. |
Real estate as a rule is the last to rise in
value and the last to fall. l think the
present values will continue until a panic
or some extraordinary financial crisis
comes to depress them"
FRANK G. CARPENTER.